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1999 Road King Quits and restarts

flyrc100

Member
My new to me Road King just now quit on an incline. Either total loss of spark or fuel. The electrical system is otherwise fine, it eventually started back up after about 20 minutes and ran OK for about 5 miles, then quit again. At least it started right back up the second time. Its rather mild and kinda rainy today, just a little drizzle. BTW-Its a fuel injected model.

I don't even know where to start on this deal,, It's my first H-D, I've put about 200 trouble free miles on it till now. Any advice? Thanks
 
Give us a little more info to work with. When it died on an incline were you facing uphill or downhill on the bike? Downhill would indicate you may be low on fuel and the gas was not reaching the petcock at the rear of the fuel tank? Quite possibly why it restarted and died again after 5 miles.

If low fuel is not a problem, what exactly happens when it dies? Do you lose all power to lights, speedo, etc. or just the motor dies? Did this happen after refueling? Also when you try to restart, does it crank over and not start or not crank at all. Any funny noises, popping missing while running etc.....
 
Well, it quit going uphill. The next time it quit, it was level ground, but it started right back up. I'm just now reporting it quit right after I got home, but again, it started right up.

It has all functions electrically, lights, starter, etc. What function is the 40 Amp breaker, and where is it located? The first time it died , the starter would turn over, but the engine would not catch. The next two times it died, it fired right back up. Thanks for the advice, flyrc
 
The electrical system is otherwise fine,

When you say that "the electrical system is otherwise fine", means to me that when the bike quits,,it will crank with some lights still ON but just won't start.
Is that correct?
 
Well, it quit going uphill. The next time it quit, it was level ground, but it started right back up. I'm just now reporting it quit right after I got home, but again, it started right up.

It has all functions electrically, lights, starter, etc. What function is the 40 Amp breaker, and where is it located? The first time it died , the starter would turn over, but the engine would not catch. The next two times it died, it fired right back up. Thanks for the advice, flyrc

Check this:

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Yes Sir, she refused to start (but would crank over) the first time. The second and third times it restarted right away. I just drained out the tank and put new fuel in it. I doubt thats the problem, but gotta start somewhere. The engine sounds great and has tons of power when its running BTW.
 
I don't have any service info for that year bike and I am just winging it but,,,

Since it is FI, you must have a check engine light. When your turn on the ignition, does the check engine light come on for a few seconds then turns OFF and STAYS off?

Or does the light come ON for a couple of seconds, goes out,, then comes back ON then goes back Off and stays OFF..

I am trying to find out if you have a stored code. I am just not sure how to extract them on a 1999.

I generally don't "shot gun" problems but if I had to take a one time shot in the dark guess,,, I would say the crank sensor is flakey.

The age is right. It would kill both ignition and spark at one time,, nothing else would be affected,, they do go bad,,and it would be a "come and go" problem driven by heat.

The tests to check them with ordinary tools is not proof positive. You almost have to substitute it with a known good one to be sure. The crank sensor is the fundamental clock signal for the entire ECM. It has to be both positive & accurate.

They are not crazy expensive...:)
 
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Well, the check engine comes on and the fuel pump spools up. After a couple seconds the check engine light goes off and stays off. I read up on the pin hole problem in the tank, and I listened for leaky sounds, or swishing, but nothing. I'm hoping the (EDIT) thing will give up the ghost, whatever the problem is. I hate intermintent problems and I have zero experience messing with an H-D. This is not a good start, especially when I had to limp it home and swap it out for the trusty Volusia,,,,

I guess I'll look up crank sensor installation, not sure were it is, but I hope its easy enough to replace, Thanks,,,

Please read and understand the info in this link below...

A Friendly Reminder - Harley Davidson Community

 
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If you don't have any historical codes, it points even more toward the crank sensor being bad. The ECM will only pick off the crank sensor being bad if it wide open or dead shorted. Low out from a crank sensor is hard to detect.

If it was my bike, I would change it even if it tested good with a meter. $50 (discounted) is not a lot to gamble.
 
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